Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ by clicking the link above.
You may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed.
To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

You call it a luxury tax but all the other companies who can build a machine with the same spec will put the parts in cheap, crappy, ugly enclosures. Their general build quality will be lower and assuming several companies build them, they will all be the same. When you have no USP your only option is to shred your margin as thin as you can bear.

Apple has their industrial design, superior build quality, superior build materials, recyclability and also OS X to set them apart from any spec clones. Oh, and Genius Bar service(s).

I have plenty of more important things to do, if only I could bring myself to do them....

Yes, I am, but I'm also overseas a lot. I heard that Waze always tracks your location even when you are not using the app. There is no option in the Privacy settings to "Track only when using the app," as far as I know. That is what I've been told. True?

Originally Posted by subego

They offer a way in the app to put it to sleep, but there's no automatic function.

iOS 11 will make the "Track only while using app" option available to all apps. Even the ones like that don't offer it. (UBER, Waze, etc.)

So has anybody found out whether the 13" MBP still has hobbled Thunderbolt ports, or are they all full-speed now?

I wrote a long response on that, but the TL;DR is that the CPU is out of PCIe lanes and Kaby Lake did not change the number. It is possible but unlikely that Apple somehow re-jiggered the design to leave more lanes for the TB3 ports, but that would only mean starving something else - probably storage.

The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.

Adding up random parts prices is a very simplistic way of estimating actual costs. Gleaning at the specs, I don't think the price is too high:
- The display will be very expensive. LG's 5K display alone costs $1300.
- The CPU (presumably these Skylake X parts costs $600 in large quantities (the 18-core daddy costs $2000 in large quantities/$2100 retail), and I doubt the X299-based motherboard will be cheap (I would expect $200+).
- If the current GPU prices are anything to go by, you'd have to spend $600+ on the GPU as well.

Add to that memory, SSD, camera and all the smaller bits and bobs, and I think the price is fair.

Well, you're saying the cost of the parts is X and the machine is Y so I'm guessing you think the machine should be X, so factory, labor, designers, all are free?

$1000 "luxury tax". Um, ok. So if Apple were like Dell they'd be using all plastic parts that break after a week.

So you're going to use hyperbole? iMacs are made of plastic too and I've had many of them break, sometimes not long after purchase, so tread carefully there. For instance, as cute as the iLamp G4s were, and I still have one I use as a clock, the front door, fans, and arm were real ****ers, and replacing any one of those components (which wasn't easy) could screw up the other two.

I'm just saying that I believe 5Gs is pretty excessive for an iMac, no matter the spec. It's not worth that, especially since you can't go on using the monitor after the PC part is obsolete.

"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr

It really is nutty that the plebeian 27" iMac has user-upgradable RAM, and the Pro doesn't. For that matter, it makes no sense that any iMac shouldn't have upgradable RAM, especially so long as Apple insists on extortion-level prices for extra RAM.

It looks like adding a door for RAM upgrades would have been simple, but I guess they figured if someone will drop $5k on an iMac, down the road they'll pay an extra $150 in labor to get more (excessively overpriced) memory.

"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr

So you're going to use hyperbole? iMacs are made of plastic too and I've had many of them break, sometimes not long after purchase, so tread carefully there. For instance, as cute as the iLamp G4s were, and I still have one I use as a clock, the front door, fans, and arm were real ****ers, and replacing any one of those components (which wasn't easy) could screw up the other two.

I'm just saying that I believe 5Gs is pretty excessive for an iMac, no matter the spec. It's not worth that, especially since you can't go on using the monitor after the PC part is obsolete.

Hyperbole? You're the one claiming shit should be done for free, dude.

iMac's plastic - well, on mine (mid-2011), there's alumin(i)um and glass on the outside. I was comparing Apple to Dell. Dell is notorious for shitty parts and design, especially in their laptops.

And as others stated here, it's 2017 and people are still talking about "Apple tax".

It really is nutty that the plebeian 27" iMac has user-upgradable RAM, and the Pro doesn't. For that matter, it makes no sense that any iMac shouldn't have upgradable RAM, especially so long as Apple insists on extortion-level prices for extra RAM.

APFS is optional for High Sierra - it will install and boot from HFS+.
Fusion drives using APFS are tripping up the current HS beta. 3TB drives in particular are not supported yet, but be cautious with APFS plus Fusion.
APFS by default is case-insensitive. Encryption is optional on macOS. It's not clear yet if you can add encryption after initial format/conversion. I assume so.
Real MacPros not supported yet - 2012 and earlier. Support is coming soonish - in time for the public beta I'm guessing.
The new 21.5" iMacs have socketed RAM and CPU. Though they're hard to get to, requiring display removal and logic board removal.
It also takes a standard 2.5" SATA drive. Display removal required. The 21.5" can be fully upgraded (except for the GPU) for the first time in years.
I'm hoping the iMac Pro is the same way plus MXM GPU. Or that Apple takes enough heat to add the missing RAM access door before release.

Before the launch of the 9.7" iPad Pro... a top of the line iPad started at $499.

Now, if you want a top of the line iPad, it starts at $649?

I hate this trend of raising the prices of the new stuff and justifying it by keeping older stuff around at the same prices they've been for years. It's their sneaky way of raising prices... but I think what it really probably does is drive a lot of their customers to buy older inferior products.

In the past, they would put out top of the line new stuff and it would cost as much as last years top of the line new stuff. Not any more. Now they put out something new and they raise the price. But hey, they kept around the 3 year old thing for the exact same price it sold for 3 years ago! What a deal!

Which is not socketed. All the other iMacs have socketed CPUs though. One step forward.

It seems Apple has decided to stop using MXMs in the iMac some time ago. It makes some sense in the 5K because it was an ultra-special display controller, but still? Only reason I can see is that they're truly out of space and thinness is the only thing that matters. This is where I think Apple has gone too far. My beloved 2009 iMac was crazy thin when it came out and people asked where the computer was. I could still disassemble it, even if it was finicky to lift out the display, and everything was replaceable. Now in their drive to make the iMac even more extremely thin, the glass is glued on and nothing is replaceable anymore. Don't get me wrong - I see the value of thinness in an iPhone that you fit in your pocket, or even an MBP that has to fit in a bag, but this is all just an illusion so the thing looks thin.

For those that don't remember, the first iMac G5 was a wonder of repairability. Five screws in the bottom grille and then you could remove the entire back and had the computer laid out before you. That is what I wish Apple would do with the iMac Pro.

The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.

I bet the new entry level iMacs still have shitty 5400rpm disks too. They are awful. They stutter and stall all the time. If you run a VM as well its even worse. They are outstripped for low power office use by 2010 models. If Apple insists on jacking their prices through the roof, they really ought to use decent components and provide decent performance.

Whats not well known is that EU allows consumers to get Macs repaired or replaced for free for up to 6 years in England. My advice to business users buying iMac Pros in the UK: Don't put the company name on the invoice.

I have plenty of more important things to do, if only I could bring myself to do them....

So you're going to use hyperbole? iMacs are made of plastic too and I've had many of them break, sometimes not long after purchase, so tread carefully there. For instance, as cute as the iLamp G4s were, and I still have one I use as a clock, the front door, fans, and arm were real ****ers, and replacing any one of those components (which wasn't easy) could screw up the other two.

I'm just saying that I believe 5Gs is pretty excessive for an iMac, no matter the spec. It's not worth that, especially since you can't go on using the monitor after the PC part is obsolete.

Moaning about a 13 year old design seems a bit harsh. I never had to replace a fan or a door on one of those and the only arm I ever did was on one that was bashed while being shopped across the Atlantic without its original box and specially moulded polystyrene supports.

Did they kill Target Display Mode on these iMacs?

I have plenty of more important things to do, if only I could bring myself to do them....

Moaning about a 13 year old design seems a bit harsh. I never had to replace a fan or a door on one of those and the only arm I ever did was on one that was bashed while being shopped across the Atlantic without its original box and specially moulded polystyrene supports.

Before the launch of the 9.7" iPad Pro... a top of the line iPad started at $499.

Now, if you want a top of the line iPad, it starts at $649?

I hate this trend of raising the prices of the new stuff and justifying it by keeping older stuff around at the same prices they've been for years. It's their sneaky way of raising prices... but I think what it really probably does is drive a lot of their customers to buy older inferior products.

In the past, they would put out top of the line new stuff and it would cost as much as last years top of the line new stuff. Not any more. Now they put out something new and they raise the price. But hey, they kept around the 3 year old thing for the exact same price it sold for 3 years ago! What a deal!

I bet the new entry level iMacs still have shitty 5400rpm disks too. They are awful. They stutter and stall all the time. If you run a VM as well its even worse. They are outstripped for low power office use by 2010 models. If Apple insists on jacking their prices through the roof, they really ought to use decent components and provide decent performance.

Whats not well known is that EU allows consumers to get Macs repaired or replaced for free for up to 6 years in England. My advice to business users buying iMac Pros in the UK: Don't put the company name on the invoice.

Six years!? Under what law? Is this some perverse implementation of the two-year EU warranty?

Also, in Germany, you need a name/business address on any bill above 100€ if you want to business expense it.

When Apple held that shindig at HQ a few months back they mentioned both a pro-level iMac and a new Mac Pro. My guess, a return to tower form-factor and VERY high starting price (considering $5k+ for iMac Pro). Speaking of which...

Originally Posted by ort888

I'm annoyed that Apple keeps slowly raising prices.

I know they cut the prices of a few low end MacBook Pros... (to what they should have been from the start)

But the iPad Pro starts at $650?

They upped the processor in the 12" MacBook, but you have to upgrade to the $1,599 model to actually get the upgrade?

I know this is nothing new, but it felt like prices were sorta coming down for a while.

Remember when you could get a decent low-end pro tower for $1,600 bucks? And it didn't totally suck?

Now the only way to get a "budget" Mac is to get one of previous models that still sell for basically what they sold for 3-5 years ago.

Six years!? Under what law? Is this some perverse implementation of the two-year EU warranty?

Also, in Germany, you need a name/business address on any bill above 100€ if you want to business expense it.

I think it is EU consumer law, though its 5 years in Scotland but 6 in England so I'm not exactly sure whats behind it. Apple kept it totally secret for years as they did with the 2 year EU warranty across Europe. You had to basically fight them to get it honoured sometimes. Now they have a form you can fill in, though Apple Stores are weird about it and AASPs charge you for the diagnostic, though you can claim it back from Apple. I've done it once. It took some work. Basically most store staff and even some of the higher ups at HQ in Cork are completely unaware of the process. I guess they don't get trained on it so they won't tell anyone.

I'm not sure about expensing things. Apple doesn't care what name goes on the invoice unless you want a business discount but as long as it goes on a company card you'll probably get away with it for tax purposes. The till receipt doesn't have to have a name on it at all, just the breakdown of price with VAT amount and the vendor's VAT registration number.

I have plenty of more important things to do, if only I could bring myself to do them....

Some of it is inflation, but I think we all got used to the first 40 years or so of the computer's existence, where things got cheaper and cheaper every year, despite inflation. That's stopped. The last 3-5 years or so, Apple has been slowly and sneakily raising the prices on everything.

I do think they're trying to move up market, which (what the hell do I know) I think is a mistake. I think if Apple put some effort into making their computers even a little bit more affordable, they would sell many many more. I've thought this for a while.

I think it is EU consumer law, though its 5 years in Scotland but 6 in England so I'm not exactly sure whats behind it. Apple kept it totally secret for years as they did with the 2 year EU warranty across Europe. You had to basically fight them to get it honoured sometimes. Now they have a form you can fill in, though Apple Stores are weird about it and AASPs charge you for the diagnostic, though you can claim it back from Apple. I've done it once. It took some work. Basically most store staff and even some of the higher ups at HQ in Cork are completely unaware of the process. I guess they don't get trained on it so they won't tell anyone.

EU consumer law stipulates TWO years of mandatory warranty, and the way it is suggested (and handled in Germany) is that this warranty covers PRE-EXISTING faults — where a fault shall be deemed "pre-existing" if it shows up within six months of purchase. After those six months, it is up to the consumer to prove that the fault was pre-existing, either as a material or design defect. The chances of that are close to zero, except in cases where Apple usually has already issued an Extended Repair Program.

Also, this warranty is between the consumer and the VENDOR, not the manufacturer. If you bought from a reseller, Apple doesn't owe you shit beyond the voluntary one-year warranty.

Different EU countries have different implementations of this law (some above and beyond the EU suggestions), but I very much doubt that "SIX YEARS OF FREE REPAIRS" is UK reality.

There are various local laws that require manufacturers to stock parts for five or six years; i.e. they need to guarantee REPAIRABILITY — but not for free.

I'm not sure about expensing things. Apple doesn't care what name goes on the invoice unless you want a business discount but as long as it goes on a company card you'll probably get away with it for tax purposes. The till receipt doesn't have to have a name on it at all, just the breakdown of price with VAT amount and the vendor's VAT registration number.

Handled differently from Germany, I see. The tax office will only accept receipts above 150€ (not 100€; just checked) if they are made out to the recipient with full name and address.

Doubt it all you like, I had a five year old MacBook Air repaired for free. It went in with a dead SSD and for some reason they did the board as well. No REP program. It was bought originally at an Apple store and repaired by an AASP. The diagnostic charge was refunded by Apple.

If we have a limit on expensing things, it must be higher than that. Plenty of hot shot business guys will blow that on lunch.

I have plenty of more important things to do, if only I could bring myself to do them....

Doubt it all you like, I had a five year old MacBook Air repaired for free. It went in with a dead SSD and for some reason they did the board as well. No REP program. It was bought originally at an Apple store and repaired by an AASP. The diagnostic charge was refunded by Apple.

A little research tells me that this is the Sale of Goods Act, and its replacement, the Consumer Rights Act.

Here, also, the same thing applies: After six months of use, it is up to the CONSUMER to PROVE that the device was faulty.
From here:

In the absence of a warranty the retailer of the goods is automatically liable for any faults which may develop within the first six months of ownership. Following this initial six month period the consumer will have to prove that any faults occurring are not down to misuse of the product or general wear and tear. Other factors such as the price paid, the specification or the model of the goods, the length of time you have had the goods and the length of time which they should last.

This means that if you have purchased a product which should last six years but which has broken down after only two the supplier or retailer will be liable to provide a satisfactory repair. If this cannot be done they should provide you with a replacement product. If neither of these can be agreed on then often a partial refund of the cost of the product can be provided.

In other words, Apple was under NO legal obligation to perform a repair for free, but they did anyway because Apple.

Doubly so if the product in question wasn't actually purchased from Apple, because, same as the EU warranty, this law requires the RETAILER, who is the actual contract partner, to fix the product, NOT the manufacturer.

This warranty can be claimed for as long as the product can be "reasonably expected" to last — which again you, the customer, need to prove in court.

You have up to six years from the date of purchase to file your claim in court.

If we have a limit on expensing things, it must be higher than that. Plenty of hot shot business guys will blow that on lunch.

I think you may have misread: above 150€, you need your name on the bill, or else the tax bureau won't accept it. That's all.

I have a feeling the policy might be slightly different now. At the time there was a page on the Apple site that basically said they'd fix stuff for 6 years if it wasn't abused. I'm oversimplifying but I know they were processing consumer law repairs at Apple Stores for a while then started farming them out to AASPs. I'm now guessing that the AASP simply knows how to fill the form out to state it was an inherent fault and is charging a 'diagnostic fee' to game the system for their benefit and for the consumer, who then gets a free repair at Apple's expense.

I have plenty of more important things to do, if only I could bring myself to do them....

Can't you use the monitor part of an imac if the hard drive is dead? I could swear I've heard of people doing it.

Otherwise, you invest 5K in the unupgradeable imac pro and after 6 years it becomes an impressive doorstop?

You can, but only on models that have DisplayPort In or Thunderbolt In. None of the Retina iMacs support that. The most useful variant, DisplayPort In, was only on two models (Late 2009 and Mid 2010). Apple could presumably return that feature now with DisplayPort 1.3, but it does not seem like something the new Apple would do.

The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.

Question: Is this definitely the professional machine Apple was talking about when they said they would "address the lack of an updated pro system" earlier this year? Because if it is the new "Mac Pro", it's a massive failure, even worse than the cylinder Mac Pro. To me, and I imagine most other professional users, a pro machine means upgradeable and highly flexible, like the aluminum and Power Mac towers of old. There's no way I'm going with something like this when it's time to upgrade the FCP/Audition/Premier machines. We left 27" monitors in the dust a long time ago.

"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr

My read on the situation is this: Cook was doubtful about making a new MP even before the trash can MP, because he saw that the volumes were so small. At the same time, MBA was blowing up and probably cannibalizing the MBP a bit. A quick study revealed why - MBA looked thin and cool, and even consumers who might have paid for an MBP went for the cheaper MBA because of the looks (I have seen this myself). The decision came down on the side of making something new that was more portable, to let the MBP be a little less Pro and a little bit thinner.

Then the trashcan MP came out, and immediately didn't sell. What's worse, it broke down a lot. Even before making a straight update to Haswell-E and Hawaii GPU, Apple gave up on it. The plan now was to instead let the iMac grow upwards - less of an investment that might cover more or less the same market (especially since modern GPUs can produce some impressive results even if they don't use 300W). This is the iMac Pro we're seeing now. However during the fall, in particular after the new MBP launch, Apple started getting some real pushback on the lack of a new MP. Apple must also have noticed that the old cheesgraters were still in use and selling for good money second hand. At this point, Apple seems to have folded. After betting for so long that the future is tower-less, they seem to have accepted that there is a small but vocal minority that absolutely needs them. This is the new MP, and I am sure it will be a tower of some sort.

So why launch the iMac Pro if it was still a year away from launch when the new MP was being designed? I can see two options: 1) the new MP is still far enough away that Apple needs a bridge, or 2) the iMac Pro is, much like the 5K iMac was, the future of the iMac.

The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.

I think they also plan to make this modular MP a proper Xserve replacement of sorts as well. Some people still want Mac servers and Mac Minis aren't always up to the task in terms of storage and throughput. iMacs are capable but its a waste having a quality 27" display attached to a server no one sits at.

I have plenty of more important things to do, if only I could bring myself to do them....

Yeah, not sure what they ought to do about it. A cheaper version would sell like absolute hot cakes but Apple are headed upmarket so they are likely to make a more expensive one and price it into oblivion.

It might be cool if they made it even smaller. Its kind of odd they never made it to run off a MagSafe PSU now I think about it. Take the keyboard and display off the MacBook Air or current MacBook and you've got one tiny, tiny Mac.
I guess if they did that and marketed it alongside a thunderbolt GPU enclosure as a more affordable/upgradable gaming rig than an iMac they might win a few fans.

I have plenty of more important things to do, if only I could bring myself to do them....

BTW, a little caveat about booting. HiC is able to boot from either HFS+ or APFS, but currently the live migrator doesn't preserve bootability. So if you want to boot from APFS, you have to format the drive as APFS first before installing, not install it on HFS+ and then convert the drive. Since Sierra's APFS support is pre-release, this pretty much means the way to go is to make a USB stick and boot from that to install.

If they opened the Mac platform to specialty parts and custom builds, Apple could easily become one of the enthusiast platforms of choice, as evidenced by Hackintoshes still being rather popular, despite Apple's best efforts to kill them off.

(
Last edited by Cap'n Tightpants; Jun 11, 2017 at 02:39 PM.
)

"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr